Even If It Hurts

If my life were a work of literature, the leitmotif representing my mother would be a straight pin.

Mama taught herself to sew when she was just a girl.  By the time I became aware of the extent of her gift, she had developed quite the reputation as a dressmaker.  Her work was easily recognizable by the flatness of her seams, the invisibility of her hems, the absence of puckers in her set-in sleeves.  She was, in contradiction to her generally lighthearted and carefree demeanor, an obsessive when it came to her sewing.

As one would expect, she made all my clothes.  Among my most vivid memories of junior high school are the remembrances of spending the afternoon at Minkovitz, trying on at least a dozen outfits with absolutely no intention of buying anything while Mama sketched each one in her tiny spiral notebook, adding meticulous notes: “Peter Pan collar” or “cut on the bias” or “tartan plaid.”  

From Minkovitz, we would cross the street to the Bulloch County Bank and continue on down the block to Belk (which had a fabric department at the time) to choose the fabric, the thread, and the zipper with which she would recreate (the same but better) my next new outfit.  

A few days ago when I was refugeeing from the hurricane, I was sharing that story with my great-niece Chambless.  She was eight when Mama died and most of her memories are of a quiet, withdrawn woman whose own memories had faded into unrecognizable images.  I wanted her to know Mama as the creative, energetic woman she had been.

As I tried to explain to Chambless the –  to her –  inconceivable notion of homemade clothes, I remembered Mama’s penchant for leaving a straight pin somewhere in every dress or skirt of blouse she made.  It was not intentional, but somehow, in the careful removal of pins from zippers and collars and seams, she always managed to miss one.  My earliest recollection of inadvertently locating the errant pin was one Sunday morning strutting myself into church, down the side aisle to our pew, the full skirt of my new dress bouncing and the bow at my waist cinched so tightly I could hardly breathe, and having to stifle a yelp as I sat down and felt the pin stab into the back of my chubby little thighs.

Mama died on November 30, 2000.  I few weeks later I was going through her cedar chest and came across a Christmas tree skirt that she had made for me when I was living in my trailer, my very first grown-up person home. I could feel my eyes getting teary as I picked up the skirt and, as I lowered my face to bury this fresh wave of grief in the fabric, I felt something sharp run across my hand. I started laughing before I even found it. Even after a number of years of use, the unfolding and encircling of lots of Christmas trees, there remained within my mother’s gift a straight pin.

Two weeks ago and four years later, as I packed up my things to make a run away from Helene and up the interstate to family and a place with air conditioning, I grabbed the quilt off of the guest room bed, a quilt Mama and I had made together in 1975.  When I woke up the next morning, in a strange place, but surprisingly refreshed, I went to throw back the quilt and felt a sharp prick on my leg.  I shook my head as my fingers maneuvered the pin through the layers of batting and fabric.  I stared at it for the longest time.  

I can not say for certain what the repeated appearance of the straight pin means.  I do not know for sure that Mama has played any part in its showing up every so often.  I will not demand that anyone else call it anything but a coincidence.  But I can and do and will hold in my heart the simple truth that love lasts forever and love will find a way to its beloved.  Even if it hurts.

Copyright 2024